Jazz Jackrabbit
I was young, and my dad was tech savvy and got me a lot of computer games, I got sonic 3 and knuckles on the pc but I never got past marble hill zone.

But Sonic with a Gun? Sign me up, Jazz Jackrabbit is a game for the DOS made by Epic Games that holds a special place in my heart due to how outright difficult it was to find and play for many years after having vague memories of it as a kid.

But I never let it go.

Megaman x4
The child is grown, the old games of yesterday are gone and lost in another computer.

Megaman x4 wound up having to replace Jazz Jackrabbit and my love of platforming and shooting, now that I think about it that green rabbit wound up being responsible for hooking me into two different franchises.

I still need to beat the final boss in this game

Pokemon Ruby
My first pokemon game I could call my own, and the one with the biggest regret and mistake of my life. I never caught groudon and the memory of failing to catch him nagged me for years.

I redeemed myself in ORAS though

DOOM (Classic)
Once upon a time, four people went into a cave, scream loudly for 24 hours while listening to heavy metal and came out with a game we're still feeling the effects of. DOOM isn't just about blood, violence, and demons, it's a game that you can play on a calculator. It's speed, the speed! It breathes into you and takes you on a dance of demon murdering carnage.

I somehow managed to hover around this game for years without even knowing its name, I finally got it about two years ago but it's defined the most recent portion of my life in what I look for in games now.

1. Shin Megami Tensei III - Nocturne
This is. My favorite game. Period. I can honestly talk for hours about it but the simple list is the atmosphere, style, sense of design and overall aesthetic are enthralling, the gameplay is quite challenging and very rewarding, it's full of soooo many mythological beings I love and in fact some of them I now like because of this game. I find myself wanting to make my games have the same effect this one's story sequences had, with how much care is taken into setting the mood with the angles, lighting, model poses that aren't used anywhere else in the game, music that shifts to different movements as the scene continues, and without a doubt I want such a fun and tactical battle system. I've yet to make even one complete, but I have hope!

2. Vagrant Story
Similar to Nocturne in that the stylistic choices and attention to detail and just overall *art* that went into this deeply affected me. I'm presently collaborating with a friend to make a game that is partly drawing inspiration from Vagrant Story with its closed setting, small cast of characters and dreary but beautiful atmosphere. The importance of understanding the defensive traits of your enemies in this game drove me to design my own monsters' defenses in a similar way, and I find myself giving them resistances for similar reasons (example, slimes are weak to piercing attacks because they slide through the jelly and hit the core).

3. SaGa 2
One of the very first RPGs on the Game Boy and one of my first as well, to this day its simple-yet-complicated stat system and the way everything felt organized and, for me at the time, big, just really affected the frame in which I view RPGs. This game in particular is one of the reasons that even if an RPG has the most enthralling story I've ever encountered, if I'm not enjoying the gameplay I'm going to get bored of it. I tend to favor story-light gameplay-focused RPGs as a result.

4. The World Ends With You
And then there's this one, which has both - a story I love with intricate goings-on behind what you see and very fun, addictive gameplay wrapped up in an unforgettable setting for me. This game is one of the reasons I have a fascination with the soul and the afterlife and my own stories tend to be built around those concepts. Not to mention how distinct and stylized the designs of the pins and Noise are, and as someone who values monsters in games that only added to my wanting to do the same. In addition, monsters lacking that stylization and seem to be thrown in "just because" tend to make me get tired of something quickly.

The Legend of Zelda: Oracle of Ages
The first video game that I purchased with my own money. I fell deeply in love with the handheld Zeldas and I think put more hours into them than any other game. It's hard to express how big an impact the Game Boy Color Zeldas had my tastes and passions towards gaming.

Pokemon FireRed
My Pokemon Yellow cartridge was messed up in such a way that I could never same my progress, so my first fully formed experience playing Pokemon was the GBA remake. Like the handheld Zeldas, this took up a considerable amount of my childhood. Connecting the game with LeafGreen, Emerald, and Colosseum made it all the sweeter, like it was one long glorious adventure.

Sonic Advance
I didn't grow up with the Sega Genesis or the Saturn or the Dreamcast, so it was a stroke of good fortune that my first Sonic game was one that captured the essence of classic Sonic so perfectly, and served as an excellent crash course on the characters and tropes of the series. Best of all, it was my introduction to Chao! What a revelation! How I yearned to play the Adventure games and raise my Chao in a 3D garden! If not for that urge I may never have truly discovered Sonic, and through Sonic the rest of SEGA's universe.

_________________

Quote NachoThePikachu :

I WILL BE AN ADMINISTRATOR, RULING OVER CHAO ISLAND
except it WON'T BE CHAO ISLAND ANYMORE
IT'LL BE BANANA ISLAnD

So, defining as opposed to personal favourites? In that case these are the games that I think shaped my taste in games the most:

Lemmings -
This is the first video game I ever played back on my family's old Mac OS 9 computer. I was born in 1996 and the game came out in 1991 so even back when I first played it in 2000 or so it was basically retro. Still to this day I think it's such a clever and unique game. I feel like Lemmings is a big part of what kickstarted my fascination with retro gaming.

Sonic Adventure 2 -
I mean I think this speaks for itself really

Paper Mario: The Thousand Year Door -
Probably my favourite game of all time. I think that this along with SA2 marked the point where video games became more than just a casual hobby to me, and still to this day I think Thousand Year Door is such a fantastic game in nearly every aspect, from gameplay to music to visuals to even the writing. More than any other game I had played up to that point, Thousand Year Door felt like a huge adventure and I was always excited to see what wild direction the next chapter was going to go in.

Tales of the Abyss -
Honestly not the greatest game? I mean it's good, but there's no excusing it's ridiculously slow pacing in the third act and it's easy to get put off by the characters when starting out. Despite that though, Abyss is still one of my all time favourites. Not counting the Mario RPGs, this was the first JRPG I actually finished and kickstarted my love for the genre after years of me assuming the genre just wasn't for me. The fast paced and fun combat kept me going for the first act, and by the second act I was surprised by how attached I had gotten to the cast and was actually invested.

Sonic Adventure 2
Played this one to death and cemented my love for 3D platformers.

Blockland
It's like LEGO bricks but online. The sheer expandability and possibilities (especially for someone who didn't have the hardware to play ROBLOX at the time) was simply amazing. People have made awesome things with it.

Jet Set Radio
The amazing soundtrack and free-flowing gameplay are almost unparalleled nowadays.

Super Smash Bros. Melee
One of my first console games (the other was Sonic Mega Collection). While I was never actually really good at Super Smash Bros. games, they're just good fun and unlike any other fighter with annoying button combos and nowhere to run.

As for me, I did this on Twitter, so I'll do it again here but with more reasoning.

Skies of Arcadia

Everyone should know this is my favourite game mainly for the feeling of adventure that the game gave off, it was something that I had never felt before and never felt again. I absolutely adored it from top to bottom, and even things that should've annoyed me never did. I've still got the copy from 6 years ago, and the original save. However, this game actually defines me in a greater way than any of the others.

If anything, the game is the reason I am who I am today. When I played it in 2012, and finished it in 2013. Not much had changed for me, and as 2014 flew by nothing changed about me either but by 2015 rolled around and I was heading off to uni I was having a hard time fitting in and my knowledge and love of this game basically saved me. I guess I never talked about it on CI before, but the main idea was that I came to uni and wasn't fitting in with the people I was staying with or having fun at the lectures and labs. I begrudgingly went to the video game soc they had and started talking to people who seemed similar to me and discovered one of them shared this game as his favourite as well and that bond basically started a new friendship and life that I've been living for the past three years.

The game basically confirmed my place here at this uni (since I was considering dropping out and moving to a new uni if I didn't like it by December) and started a life of Mahjong, Anime, Programming, Pool, Pub Quizzes and more. I remember thinking that I hadn't changed much since I was 16 when I was 19, well now I feel completely different to my 19 year old self and honestly if I hadn't played that game and loved it as much as I did, I doubt I'd be here at uni today.

Phoenix Wright: Ace Attorney

I was 11 when I first played Phoenix Wright: Ace Attorney. I remember it quite fondly to be honest. My brother downloaded the game onto an R4 cart back in the Summer of that year (probably around September) and I remember that any new game he put on the cart would be something of interest since I could never update the games on there.

I started it and noticed he was already halfway through Case 2 (cross examining the final person, as well) and I tried my hand at what was going on. I had no idea how the game worked so I was reading what was being told, and was using evidence without thought (well, some thought I objected to Redd White talking about a 9am meeting, with Maya's phone that talked about meeting up at 9am, but it never worked) eventually I asked my brother if I could start a new game and play, and he said it was fine since he wasn't liking it as much.

When I got around to playing, man I LOVED it. The music, the characters, the gameplay. Case 1-4 remains my favourite case of the series, in my favourite game of the series. The first Phoenix Wright game basically gave me my most basic tropes for liking anything in media. (Strong vs Weak, Underestimating main character, loneliness, bad guys turning good, turning a situation around, mindgames and more). If I were to look at any of the games, movies, book, shows, manga, anime and such that I enjoy or rank highly I could probably link something back to the first Ace Attorney game.

To me, this game was basically a big change in my life. It was sort of like discovering porn or something when your 12 and seeing how your life has changed from then on. It's an odd comparison but by the time I finished the game, I really did feel a lot different as a person, and even though I never finished the final case until years later the game still stuck with me. I say it shaped me in terms of my taste in a lot of stuff, as well as some friendships, embarrassing teenage moments and more.

Ghost Trick: Phantom Detective

Though, I'm not sure about this myself. I'd say Ghost Trick has probably defined my in some way. It's one of the only games that I consider close to perfect that I've ever played, with the only debatable downside being that it is has no replay value since you remember it so clearly.

Honestly, it might no have shaped me like the above two did, but I like to think that the game was a good transition in my life. It was the last game I really loved in my teenage years before I became quite jaded in reference to newer games. The last game that I could really say has given off any sort of vibe these days are spaced out such as The Wonderful 101, Alien Isolation and Titanfall 2. Even on my 3x3, it's the latest game to ever come out if we're not counting the Japanese release for me. It just shows that after that gaming really took a turn for me, and my life as well. I was 14 when it came out and the only other game from that year on my 3x3 is Fallout New Vegas, yet that didn't really shape me as much as say Ghost Trick did.

I'd say that after that point in time I really wanted to find the best gaming could offer me. While nothing has surpassed Ghost Trick it's the game that made me want to find another game like it, and while I haven't the journey it has taken me on has been great in it's own right. Hell, to add onto the Skies of Arcadia point. I once offered this game to a friend who back then hated me for a few hours UNTIL I offer him this game (and he played it and enjoyed it) along with the fact I've given it to several people over the past three years and they've loved it as well.

God Hand

I'd say that for me God Hand was probably the game that elevated me beyond others in terms of games as well as the fact that the game is probably the "other" side of Phoenix Wright's trope making.

It's wacky, fun, over the top, hilarious, intense, fast paced as well as laid back. The game is pretty much the other side of me, and in a way it was also the game that really made me try and look for other games in a similar manner in this medium. It was probably the game that gave me/solidified my "good taste" in games. It was also a nice game to really remind me that I can be good at video games if I put my time into them, I can play and beat God Hand on Hard without much difficulty just because I practiced with it a lot mostly because it was so fun. It's in my top 3 just because it has infinite repeatability to me, I could play it again and again if I wanted to.

God Hand probably has the least to do with changing me overall (though I did spend a good 3 years on it to get good at the game since I loved it so much) but I do think that it gave me another set of tropes to enjoy and love, as well as helped me get a much better taste in gaming. It also made me make some cool friends both online and offline due to enjoying the game a lot. I can't really think of much else to say for it.

Honorable Mentions:
Sonic Adventure 2: You all know why.
Metropolis Street Racer: While this game didn't really have much to do with me as a person, it's always the game I remember when I think of the time I stayed up all night to play the Dreamcast when I was 4 years old and from there it basically started me on this gaming adventure I've been on for the past 18 years.
Pokemon Red/Gold/Sapphire: Can't really pinpoint it, but I do know that these games did have a good effect on my life as well as my outlook on life as a kid. Also really made me want to go on an adventure, as well as other things. While I can't explain it well, I'd say these games really did have an effect on my childhood.
Link's Awakening/Minish Cap: Same as the above really. Really had an effect on my childhood as well as other things. The game basically gave me an interest in things like Swords, Shields, Bows, Arrows, Boomerangs, Bombs and such. I also really adored the world. Minish Cap was also my favourite game until I played Skies of Arcadia.

Thanks for reading this far if you did, but yeah that's what I think are the four games that truly described me.

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